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About the Authors

Jon Chappell is a multistyle guitarist, transcriber, and arranger. He attended Carnegie-Mellon University, where he studied with Carlos Barbosa-Lima. He went on to earn his master’s degree in composition from DePaul University, where he also taught theory and ear training. He was formerly editor-in-chief of Guitar magazine, technical editor of Guitar Shop Magazine, and musicologist for Guitarra, a classical magazine. He has played and recorded with Pat Benatar, Judy Collins, Graham Nash, and Gunther Schuller, and he has contributed numerous musical pieces to film and TV. Some of these include Northern Exposure; Walker, Texas Ranger; Guiding Light; and the film Bleeding Hearts, directed by Gregory Hines. In 1990, he became associate music director of Cherry Lane Music, where he has transcribed, edited, and arranged the music of Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, Steve Morse, Mike Stern, and Eddie Van Halen, among others.

Chappell has more than a dozen method books to his name and is the author of The Recording Guitarist — A Guide for Home and Studio, published by Hal Leonard. He is the author of Rock Guitar For Dummies and co-author of Guitar For Dummies, 2nd Edition, Blues Guitar For Dummies, Classical Guitar For Dummies, and Guitar Exercises For Dummies (Wiley).

Mark Phillips is a guitarist, arranger, and editor with more than 30 years in the music publishing field. He earned his bachelor’s degree in music theory from Case Western Reserve University, where he received the Carolyn Neff Award for scholastic excellence, and his master’s degree in music theory from Northwestern University, where he was elected to Pi Kappa Lambda, the most prestigious U.S. honor society for college music students. While working toward a doctorate in music theory at Northwestern, Phillips taught classes in theory, ear training, sight singing, counterpoint, and guitar.

During the 1970s and early 1980s, Phillips was director of popular music at Warner Bros. Publications, where he edited and arranged the songbooks of such artists as Neil Young, James Taylor, the Eagles, and Led Zeppelin. Since the mid-’80s he has served as director of music and director of publications at Cherry Lane Music, where he has edited or arranged the songbooks of such artists as John Denver, Van Halen, Guns N’ Roses, and Metallica, and has been music editor of the magazines Guitar and Guitar One.

Phillips is the author of several books on musical subjects, including Metallica Riff by Riff, Sight-Sing Any Melody Instantly, and Sight-Read Any Rhythm Instantly. He is co-author of Guitar For Dummies, 2nd Edition, Blues Guitar For Dummies, Classical Guitar For Dummies, and Guitar Exercises For Dummies (Wiley).

Dave Austin has written the critically acclaimed book The Unfinished Cross — Listen to the Voice Within, published by Hampton Roads Publishing Company. He is also CEO of Transcension Music Group, a record company with a mission to bring positive music to the forefront of today’s listening audience and bring together well-respected veterans in the music industry for a common cause of taking quality music to a higher level. Over the past 20 years, Dave, along with his good friend Phil Ehart (founding member of Kansas), has produced and promoted all-star concerts with some of the greatest talent in the industry. Dave lives in Camarillo, California, with his wife, Cathy, and his four sons, Jason, Shane, Chase, and Daniel. You can visit Dave at www.daveaustin.org. He is co-author of Songwriting For Dummies (Wiley).

Mary Ellen Bickford has been involved in writing, film production, and music for more than 20 years. She has authored two books, The Language of Light (co-authored with Norman B. Miller) and Eloquence, a book of poetry. She has also written and co-written film scripts, treatments, and corporate publications. Her work in film production includes coordinating the filming of Hands Across America and the unveiling of the Statue of Liberty Celebration for Imax producer Greg MacGillivray. She was also the director of education for the noted Imax movie The Living Sea. Currently, Mary Ellen serves as an officer and board member for two nonprofit organizations: the DoveSong Foundation (providing education about positive music) and Kids X-Pressions Inc. (providing opportunities for the young at heart to express themselves freely through the media). Mary Ellen currently lives in northern Georgia, where she co-writes songs with her husband, composer/musician Don Robertson. You may find out more about their work by visiting www.dovesong.com. She is co-author of Songwriting For Dummies (Wiley).

Holly Day is a music journalist whose articles have appeared in publications all over the world, including Computer Music Journal, ROCKRGRL, Music Alive!, Guitar One, and Mixdown magazines. Her writing has received an Isaac Asimov Award, a National Magazine Award, and two Midwest Writer’s Grants. She is co-author of Music Theory For Dummies and Music Composition For Dummies (Wiley).

Scott Jarrett is a musician and producer who has worked with numerous artists, including Willie Nelson, Fiona Flanagan, Mary Klueh, and Keith Jarrett. He has served as music director for many live theatrical productions, including the Broadway production of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. He currently runs Monkey House recording studio in Hudson, Wisconsin, and has released two original albums, Without Rhyme or Reason and The Gift of Thirst. He has taught music theory, composition, production, and/or recording at the Full Sail Center for the Recording Arts in Orlando, the Acting Conservatory in Nashville, and McNally-Smith School of Music in St. Paul, Minnesota. He is co-author of Music Composition For Dummies (Wiley).

Jim Peterik has enjoyed a 35-year love affair with music. He has written or co-written a memorable array of top-40 hits such as Hold On Loosely,Caught Up In You, and Rocking Into The Night with Southern-rock legends 38 Special; Heavy Metal (theme to the award-winning animation of the same name) with Sammy Hagar; and with group co-founder Frankie Sullivan, wrote the entire catalogue for the group Survivor (of which Jim was a founding member), including smash hits like High on You,I Can’t Hold Back,Is This Love,Burning Heart (theme from Rocky IV), the number-one single The Search Is Over, and the triple-platinum, Grammy-winning, Oscar-nominated theme from Rocky III — Eye of the Tiger. Today, when not spending time with his wife, Karen, and son, Colin, Jim is busy discovering and producing new talent and collaborating with some of the world’s best songwriters. He still plays regularly with the Ides of March and performs with his World Stage superstar lineup for special events. In his solo Storytellers style concerts, he tells the stories behind the songs he’s written throughout the years. You can visit Jim at www.jimpeterik.com. He is co-author of Songwriting For Dummies (Wiley).

Michael Pilholfer teaches music theory and percussion at McNally Smith College of Music in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he serves as department head of the Ensembles Department. He has worked as a professional musician for more than 18 years and has toured and recorded with Joe Lovano, Marian McPartland, Kenny Wheeler, Dave Holland, Bill Holman, Wycliffe Gordon, Peter Erskine, and Gene Bertoncini. He is co-author of Music Theory For Dummies (Wiley).

Publisher’s Acknowledgments

We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments through our Dummies online registration form located at http://dummies.custhelp.com. For other comments, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax 317-572-4002.

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Introduction

So you want to play guitar, eh? No one can blame you. The guitar isn’t just a beautiful, soulful, and versatile instrument. For about 75 years now, it has also set the standard for coolness in the music world. Not a bad combination!

Though the guitar as we know it is only about a century and a half old, its roots as a plucked stringed instrument go back deep into history. Many ancient folk instruments have followed the basic strings-stretched-over-fretboard-and-played-with-fingers design for thousands of years, and the guitar is in some ways the culmination of that legacy. It seems humans have always had something like the guitar in mind.

After the guitar was electrified in the 1930s — that is, when it went from soft backup instrument to a forceful and expressive vehicle for soloing — its popularity skyrocketed, and its intrinsic qualities and sound changed popular music forever. But its softer side didn’t go away. When Bob Dylan famously plugged in at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival and was booed by outraged folk fans, it became clear that the electric guitar had entered its own universe.

Guitar All-in-One For Dummies covers both the acoustic and the electric universes — as well as the older classical guitar one, which has its own language, techniques, and musical pedigree.

About This Book

First, here’s what this book is not: It’s not a textbook, nor a long-winded history, nor a rote learning tool. Lots of those kinds of books are on the market, if that’s what you’re looking for — but beware, they are often dry and assume underlying knowledge.

Guitar All-in-One For Dummies is a generous conglomeration of material from several For Dummies guitar and music books. It aims to cover the guitar gamut, from what those thingies are called that wind the strings (tuning machines) to how Stevie Ray Vaughan got his incredible sound (by tuning lower, among other tricks) to which chords just plain sound good together when writing songs (depends — see Chapter 4 in Book VII).

Much of the material is relevant to any style of guitar playing. But three popular guitar genres each get their own book: rock guitar, blues guitar, and classical guitar. You also find chapters on learning to read music, on building your chord repertoire, on amps, scales, songwriting . . . let’s just say there’s a lot here. And don’t forget the CD!

Conventions Used in This Book

Important words are defined in italics. Key words in lists that bring important ideas to your attention are in bold. And all Web addresses are in monofont to set them apart.

Here are a few other conventions to help you navigate this book:

Right hand and left hand: Instead of using strumming hand and fretting hand, this book uses right hand for the hand that picks or strums the strings and left hand for the hand that frets the strings (it’s easier and shorter that way). Sincere apologies to those left-handed readers who are using this book; you folks should read right hand to mean left hand and vice versa.

Up and down, higher and lower, and so on: If you’re asked to move a note or chord up the guitar neck or to play it higher on the neck, it means higher in pitch, or toward the body of the guitar. If you’re asked to go down or lower on the neck, it means toward the headstock, or lower in pitch. (Those of you who hold your guitar with the headstock tilted upward may need to do a bit of mental adjustment whenever you see these terms. Just remember that these terms are about pitch, not position, and you’ll do just fine.)

Dual music notation: Songs and exercises are arranged with the standard music staff on top and the tablature staff below. You can use either of these methods, but you don’t need to look at both at the same time. In many cases, the music under scrutiny also is on the CD, so look for black boxes that point you to specific tracks on the CD and then follow along.

What You’re Not to Read

There are many sidebars (in shaded gray boxes) in this book that you don’t really need to read in order to follow the chapter text. They contain extra information or background stories and history that you may be interested in, or not. Feel free to skip anything marked with the Technical Stuff icon, too.

Foolish Assumptions

Guitar All-in-One For Dummies doesn’t assume you know anything about playing guitar or reading music. It starts from zero and builds from the ground up — and then keeps going and going. It contains straightforward, informal explanations of how guitars work, what the different kinds are, how to get started playing, how to form chords and strum and fingerpick, and then proceeds to help deepen your knowledge in several directions.

This book is designed for just about anyone who loves guitar. It is as useful for people who have barely touched a guitar as it is for those who have fiddled around with one for years but would like to get more serious. Even advanced players — such as those who would like to try a different genre than they’re used to, or who specifically need to work on, say, their outside chord inversion patterns — will find plenty of valuable information in these pages.

No matter your situation, experience, or motives, this book’s goal is to give you enough information so that ultimately you can explore the guitar on your own. Discovering what the instrument can do, finding ways to make new sounds, suddenly grasping a better way to fret notes or chords that just minutes ago seemed impossible — these are tremendously exciting and satisfying experiences. Such magic awaits you if you’re willing to put in some time and effort.

How This Book Is Organized

Guitar All-in-One For Dummies is sorted into eight books so you can find what you need to know quickly.

Book I: Guitar 101

The first book begins with the basics by looking at how guitars are constructed, what the different parts are, and how to go about acquiring a guitar that suits your style and budget. The mechanics of getting up and running are covered here, such as stringing and tuning the instrument, and the basic how-to of playing it. A chapter in this book also tackles reading music — a skill which isn’t required to play guitar, but is helpful in many ways.

Book II: Sounds and Techniques

This book gets you going in playing guitar, starting with basic major and minor chords. Did you know you can play probably half of the most famous songs ever by knowing just three or four chords? It’s true. Of course, after you get a taste of E minor, you’re going to want to try E7 . . . and that’s how you get hooked. This book also discusses strumming, plucking, and picking techniques. By the time you finish this book, you should have all the knowledge you need to play, in basic form, loads and loads of songs on guitar.

Book III: Rock Guitar

Nowadays, when people think of a guitar, they usually picture someone in tight pants and insufficiently trimmed hair coaxing unholy sounds out of it. That’s because rock ’n’ roll really brought the guitar to the forefront of popular culture, beginning in the middle of the last century. This book focuses on All Things Rock: the nitty-gritty of amplifiers, playing hot licks and sweet leads, and checking out just how the greatest guitar heroes do what they do. From Chuck Berry to Keith Richards, from Jimi Hendrix to The Edge, this book is your key to unlocking what makes rock guitar so exciting.

Book IV: Blues Guitar

A basic guitar is cheap to buy (or make), and it’s perfect for strumming while you sing — which meant it was the ideal instrument for African Americans to entertain themselves and their neighbors in the rural South during hard times. The result: a unique musical genre that’s as full of emotion and passion as it is easy to play. But the blues didn’t stop at the porch — it migrated to various parts of the U.S. (and eventually Great Britain and elsewhere) and developed into many distinct styles. It also helped birth rock ’n’ roll. This book explores all aspects of the blues, from picking styles to signature riffs, from the evolution of different song forms to the achievements of the great blues guitarists in history.

Book V: Classical Guitar

The other iconic image of a guitar player is a romantic-looking fellow, seated and holding a humble acoustic guitar, playing gorgeous and complicated instrumental music. This book makes it clear that rock and blues are the new kids on the block. Classical guitar figured out early on that the great Baroque, Classical, and Romantic compositions weren’t just for violin and cello after all. This book delves into the history and development of classical guitar, both as an instrument and a style. It contains lots of music to play, too, including standards that are surprisingly easy to play and more challenging, complex pieces that vividly separate the virtuosos from the noodlers.

Book VI: Exercises: Practice, Practice, Practice

How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, and lots of it, is the only way you’ll ever stand on stage with confidence, poised to amaze and delight a crowd. Many guitarists find that after several months or even years of playing, their abilities plateau — they don’t get worse, but they don’t get better. They have reached stasis in their playing. And that may be fine, depending on commitment level. But at that point, one sure-fire way to keep improving is to repeatedly work the fingers through rigorous practice exercises. In this book you find lots and lots of moderate and advanced scales, chords, and arpeggio training designed to correct deficiencies and rev up stalled skills.

Book VII: Writing Songs and Music

Picking up a guitar and playing songs and compositions written by your favorite artists is fun, no question about it. But there may well come a point when you feel the urge to contribute something original of your own. How exactly do you go about that? Well, you could stumble around trying out random chords as you think up things that rhyme (please don’t rhyme fire with desire again, okay, please?) — or you could approach the challenge armed with some wisdom from people who do it for a living. It turns out that writing songs is both an art and a science. This book is chock-full of tips and tricks to use when writing music, such as using the inherent melodies in scales and chords and putting chords together in proven progressions that evoke precisely the mood and feeling you’re after.

Book VIII: Appendixes

Guitar All-in-One For Dummies dim7 — and an appendix on using the CD.

Icons Used in This Book

You’ll see four icons scattered around the margins of the text. Each icon points out a certain type of information about guitars and guitar playing. They go as follows:

This icon notes something you should keep in mind. It may refer to something covered earlier in the book, or it may highlight something you ought to remember in the future.

This icon flags the boring (but sometimes helpful) stuff. Feel free to skip text with this icon. On the other hand, you may be interested to know extra details or little-known trivia about the topic at hand, in which case by all means, read away.

Information marked with this icon usually tells you how to play something better, faster, or easier. Sometimes it refers to especially helpful ideas and advice that can enrich your guitar experience.

This icon points out stuff you should avoid. Guitar players often pick up bad habits that can limit their playing — watch out for this icon so you can head off trouble at the pass.

Where to Go from Here

Where to go depends on your level of skill. You may as well start with Chapter 1 in Book I if you know nothing about guitars, to lay a solid foundation for what comes later — after all, if you don’t know what we’re talking about later on, the book isn’t of much use. If you have a little experience with guitar, try beginning with Book II for a brush-up on the basics and then move on from there. If you know guitar basics but are interested in finally trying to read music, head straight to Chapter 4 in Book I.

If you’re already okay on guitar, and you know how to do things like form 7th chords and use a pick to make a controlled, bouncy rhythm, head to the chapters in the book about your favorite genre and dive in — Books III, IV, and V. We guarantee you’ll learn something new and probably encounter some challenges.

If you’re already a good guitar player, well . . . the thing is, you know in your heart you’re not as good as you could be. Make for Book VI to really give those fingers a workout. And if you have the flickering of a new song in your heart, first find a voice recorder (or pen and paper if you can write music) and record your idea while it’s still in your head. Then head to Book VII to check out a ton of ideas on how to develop your soon-to-be hit song.

All right then — it’s time to get going. Good luck and much success in your playing!

Book I

Guitar 101

In this book . . .

We start by checking out how guitars are built and how to tune them so they sound just right. We go into buying a guitar (or two) that fits your wallet and lifestyle. We also wade into beginning to actually play the things — settling into position, forming simple chords, and strumming. Finally, because we are sadists, we give you a chapter on reading music, something that’s not necessary but can come in handy and will help you get more out of this book.

Here are the contents of Book I at a glance.

Chapter 1: Guitar Anatomy and Tuning

Chapter 2: Developing Basic Playing Skills

Chapter 3: Buying and Stringing Guitars

Chapter 4: Deciphering Music Notation and Tablature

Chapter 1

Guitar Anatomy and Tuning

In This Chapter

Identifying the different parts of the guitar

Understanding how the guitar works

Keeping track of strings and frets

Using one string to tune the rest

Tuning to a fixed reference

All guitars — whether painted purple with airbrushed skulls and lightning bolts or finished in a natural-wood pattern with a fine French lacquer — share certain physical characteristics that make them behave like guitars and not violins or tubas. If you’re confused about the difference between a headstock and a pickup, this chapter is for you. It describes the differences among the various parts of the guitar, tells you what those parts do, and explains why the guitar sounds the way it does.

This chapter also describes several different methods to get your guitar in tune. Tuning is to guitarists what parallel parking is to city drivers: an everyday and necessary activity that can be vexingly difficult to master. And the task is never fun. Unlike the piano, which a professional tunes and can’t be adjusted until the next time the professional tuner comes to visit, the guitar is normally tuned by its owner — and it needs constant adjusting.

The Anatomy of a Guitar

Guitars come in two basic flavors: acoustic and electric. From a hardware standpoint, electric guitars have more components and doohickeys than do acoustic guitars. Guitar makers generally agree, however, that making an acoustic guitar is harder than making an electric guitar. That’s why, pound for pound, acoustic guitars cost just as much or more than their electric counterparts.

Acoustic and electric guitars have very similar constructions, despite a sometimes radical difference in tone production (unless, of course, you think that Segovia and Metallica are indistinguishable). Figures 1-1 and 1-2 show the various parts of an acoustic and electric guitar.

Figure 1-1: A typical acoustic guitar with its major parts labeled.

Here are the functions of the various parts of a guitar:

Back (acoustic only): The part of the body that holds the sides in place; made of two or three pieces of wood.

Bar (electric only): A metal rod attached to the bridge that varies the string tension by tilting the bridge back and forth. Also called the tremolo bar, whammy bar, vibrato bar, and wang bar.

Body: The box that provides an anchor for the neck and bridge and creates the playing surface for the right hand. On an acoustic, the body includes the amplifying sound chamber that produces the guitar’s tone. On an electric, it consists of the housing for the bridge assembly and electronics (pickups as well as tone and volume controls).

Bridge: The metal (electric) or wooden (acoustic) plate that anchors the strings to the body.

End pin: A metal post where the rear end of the strap connects. On acoustic-electrics (acoustic guitars with built-in pickups and electronics), the pin often doubles as the output jack where you plug in.

Fingerboard: A flat, plank-like piece of wood that sits atop the neck, where you place your left-hand fingers to produce notes and chords. The fingerboard is also known as the fretboard, because the frets are embedded in it.

Frets: Thin metal wires or bars running perpendicular to the strings that shorten the effective vibrating length of a string, enabling it to produce different pitches.

Headstock: The section that holds the tuning machines and provides a place for the manufacturer to display its logo. Not to be confused with Woodstock, a famous upstate New York concert in 1969.

Neck: The long, clublike wooden piece that connects the headstock to the body.

Nut: A grooved sliver of stiff nylon, brass, bone, or other synthetic substance that stops the strings from vibrating beyond the neck. The strings pass through the grooves on their way to the tuners in the headstock. The nut is one of the two points at which the vibrating area of the string ends. (The other is the bridge.)

Output jack (electric only): The insertion point for the cord that connects the guitar to an amplifier or other electronic device.

Pickup selector (electric only): A switch that determines which pickups are currently active.

Sides (acoustic only): Separate curved wooden pieces on the body that join the top to the back.

Strap pin: Metal post where the front, or top, end of the strap connects. (Note that not all acoustics have a strap pin. If the guitar is missing one, tie the top of the strap around the headstock.)

Strings: The six metal (for electric and steel-string acoustic guitars) or nylon (for classical guitars) wires that, drawn taut, produce the notes. Although not strictly part of the actual guitar — you attach and remove them at will on top of the guitar — strings are an integral part of the whole system, and a guitar’s entire design and structure revolves around making the strings ring out with a joyful noise. (You can find out more about strings and tuning later in this chapter.)

Top: The face of the guitar. On an acoustic, this piece is also the sounding board, which produces almost all the guitar’s acoustic qualities. On an electric, the top is merely a cosmetic or decorative cap that overlays the rest of the body material.

Tuning machines: Geared mechanisms that raise and lower the tension of the strings, drawing them to different pitches. The string wraps tightly around a post that sticks out through the top, or face, of the headstock. The post passes through to the back of the headstock, where gears connect it to a tuning key. Also known as tuners, tuning pegs, tuning keys, and tuning gears.

Volume and tone controls (electric only): Knobs that vary the loudness of the guitar’s sound and its bass and treble frequencies.